Great article about boys and men

[wsbill]

... in response to that's nuts, posted by vagn on May 17, 2003

Where do you get off on that idea.  It's going to happen!
America are up to their eyeballs in debt and still spending money.  Factories are closing up and moving to China or Mexico, were at 10% unemployment (Fed sez 6-8%, but that's not counting all those whom have given up looking).

How to get those jobs back?

Crash the economy, which will lower working wage.

Inflation has pushed everyones pay scale up, but with the jobs being relocated to the far east and nothing to support those high wages, people expect to be always paid a higher wage.  But without jobs paying big bucks, even unions are having a hard time surviving.

Look what Warren Buffett is doing.  He is hunkering down and buying up infastructure companies for his Berkshire Funds.

He's right now in the process of buying up Clayton Homes (mobile home type maker), WHY?

Because when the economy collapses, people will be forced to move out of their $200-500K homes and down grade into a cheaper priced $35-50k... So long as you have a roof over your head, who cares.  I image the folks who have those expensive homes will or might be able to take whatever equity they have now and buy a $35-50K home.

Do you agree, we as America have it better than most people in the world?  Our standard of living is much higher than anyone else.  But without jobs, I don't know how much debt you have (car, house, credit card, boat, etc....).

But if you lost your job tomorrow would you be able to find another quickly at the same wage.  Granted, I'm sure a few of  you guys would be able to.  But the vast majority of americans would not.

You should read this book.  Called Deflation by Gary
http://www.agaryshilling.com/deflation.html

Shilling, has a column in Forbes Magazine every once and a while.  I read the book prior to this one back in 1987, which he highlighted saying car makers would be offering zero percent financing... I told my friends about it at the time and they just laugh.  -- wonder who's laughing now.

Though he doesn't say anything about it in the book, but my logic sez.. The current situation with SARS virus, sure looks pretty interesting...perhaps a way to twart companies from relocating overseas.  I wouldn't be surprised if a FSU country released this virus, because the FSU with it's fairly high skilled workers are going to miss out on a industrial revolution like we enjoy as well as CHINA is enjoy.

The Gov't has some deep thinkers, who think ahead of the curve, we want to preserve our way of life and so they'll do anything to setup our economy for the coming future generations.  If we don't do it some other country will.

If it means hard times ahead, so be it.  Get out of debt and downsize to a much simpler why of life.

[Bobby Orr]

... in response to Re: Hardship, a deflation book everyone ..., posted by wsbill on May 17, 2003

Bill - I agree Gary Schilling is an excellent read.  I subscribe to Forbes and look forward to reading his column.  Usually he is correct - it is quite amazing.  

Never the less, I strongly disagree with the bulk of your argument:  

"Though he doesn't say anything about it in the book, but my logic sez.. The current situation with SARS virus, sure looks pretty interesting...perhaps a way to twart companies from relocating overseas. I wouldn't be surprised if a FSU country released this virus, because the FSU with it's fairly high skilled workers are going to miss out on a industrial revolution like we enjoy as well as CHINA is enjoy."

The above paragraph is just goobley-gook in my mind.  

[wsbill]

... in response to Re: Re: Hardship, a deflation book every..., posted by Bobby Orr on May 17, 2003

Made america what it is today.  The FSU is going to miss out totally on one.  They'll have some infastructure building, heck, SARS just might have came from North Korea or Tawian or Japan or USA.

More so the latter.  We really do want to see Eastern European countries prosper and China is very still a very closed up nation, hence they're helping themselves rebuild their nation at everyone elses expense...especially in the way they keep devalueing their dollar.

Just like in Kosovo we bomb the Chinese embassy (sorry-oops).  The Chinese sold Saddam alot of advance technology, I even think it was those Radars were from China/Ukraine.

[wsbill]

... in response to Re: Hardship, a deflation book everyone ..., posted by wsbill on May 17, 2003

Not when everyone else puts there 200K-500K homes on the market.  Just imagine our economy in crash mode, we are talking about mass forclosures!!  Who will own those homes, banks.  What do banks do with all the repo cars they get back, the sell them for less than book value to move them off their lot.  They'll do the same thing when they get homes, but who is going to buy your lofty estate, when they can get it from the bank for less.  

Deflation is across the board and into everyones business.

What is Federal Gov't going to do about it.  They're going to dump massive amounts of money into our economy, trying to get people to spend (sounds like the Bush tax plan).

Only problem is - the rich will not spend their money, they tend to save it and the poor will probably use it to pay on any old debts /some will blow it of course.

Should be noted it's the poor people, middle class and lower who actually support this economy ... more of them.

What happens when their jobs vanish, or have to go to a lower pay scale.

After the crash, our economy will come back when companies start to rebuild our infastructure (probably 2 years after the crash), bear in mind this recession is now 2 years old.
I for see our current economy growing, but not at the massive clip as from 1998-2000, when the stock market rocketed to new highs.

Ever hear of Kondratieff Wave, ask your russian wife who he was?

[Travis]

... in response to Re: Sell your home NOW, posted by wsbill on May 17, 2003

I won't say this will never happen because it has before (depression). But, first off, banks don't want to forclose on homes in large numbers! If they do, they are still liable for the property taxes. Those are state taxes, not federal. Second, the Bush tax plan does make sense. Rich people's spending habits don't drive the economy in this country, it never has. It is the middle class that primarily makes our economy work. Keep an eye on consumer confidence, that is really the indicator of where the economy is at and going. Wwith the tax cut, middle class Americans will have a little more spending capacity, that will boost confidence and hopefully right the economy. After all, isn't the overall economy built on confidence?

I do agree with you about jobs going overseas to an extent. I don't like it much but I see the point in the end. Regarding China, I think the end goal is to make them a consumer nation as we are. They currently are not but there are a billion of them +. How many Chinese own anything currently with a Made in the USA label? My guess is just a handfull, because they can't afford it. Same with Russia, Ukraine and other FSU countries.

Crashing the economy won't help anything! I wouldn't want to see this country in that kind of mayham. Demanding corporate responsibility, absolutely. Telling our congressman and senators to stop spending money on stupid things, absolutely. Do I really need to spend my money to find out how a pig reacts to chicken pox? NO! But our goverment does this sorta thing very often.

Regarding the stock market of the late 90's. It was a bubble and needed to be burst. The market does ajust itself every few years or so. There were company stocks that were WAY over valued!!! Investers new that! They were just hoping to get in there and get a piece of the pie. The real down side, and what hurt most of us, was that most middle class people don't directly invest in the market, we use brokers or have retirement funds. The brokers were playing the game (with our money) and investing in companies that they knew had no real value.

[DanM]

... in response to Re: Re: Sell your home NOW, posted by Travis on May 17, 2003

Mortgage companies and banks don't want to foreclose for a lot of reasons, but the property taxes usually are not a big reason. Property taxes will not become a big issue unless the home is vacant for years. In that case, they mortgage company has much more exposure from the standpoint of a lower value in a property. When it is vacant for years, usually things happen to lower the value.

Usually the lender can recoup the value of the loan in a foreclosure sale unless it was either a poorly underwritten loan or a higher LTV loan. In the case of high LTV loans, the lender should have charge a higher rate of interest and created a cash reserve to compensate for losses due to the higher LTV. At the end of the day the lenders are all going for the same yield on their loans and they view the higher interest as a cushion for forecasted losses on higher risk loans.

Even when the lender is fully reimbursed, however, you still have the issue of run off (ie interest-paying loans leaving your books).

[wsbill]

... in response to Re: Re: Sell your home NOW, posted by Travis on May 17, 2003

It'll jam packed full of facts and graphs, etc... real simple read, but to the point.

The exodus of jobs must come to a stop.  Like I say, the market ain't gonna crash tomorrow, but in 3-5 years when the American people wake up from the current spending sprees that've been on, everyone will turn into savers.

And what do you think that'll do to our economy.  Last time I looked consumer confidence was in the toilet with job losses.

http://biz.yahoo.com/rb/030517/column_newbiz_1.html

New word'olgy to the average joe is deflation.  You will see it more and more.  And that's going to scare the daylights out of everybody.

Most will probably ignore the warning signs, those that don't will capitalize at the expense of others.

Remember buy low or wait til it goes lower, like morgage rates will.   I think Al Queda knows how our economy works and just when the market was getting some steam up, out of the blue come these recent bombings and now they're saying to be on your guard for something in the US.

[DanM]

... in response to Re: You should get that book on deflatio..., posted by wsbill on May 17, 2003

Jobs are only going to leave this country because of non-competitive labor prices. These labor prices will not change unless we lower the acceptable standard of living for a big part of our population. Since that is not likely to happen, lets look for ways to create new jobs that better fit the wage prices within this country. To me that seems a lot more constructive than trying to return us to the 1950s when most people just don't want to go back in time. That time is gone and its never coming back so lets just move on into the 21st century together and make the best of it. You just aren't going to find people who will try to live on 12,000 per year. Its not going to happen.

The problem is that our people are not properly trained or educated to staff the jobs needed by our economy. We are importing doctors and computer programers like crazy. Most areas of the country are in dire need of skilled workers such as electricians or certain specializations within the field of construction. If more people would become educated in the fields we need, then we could give these jobs to Americans instead of giving them to peope from other places.

[Bobby Orr]

... in response to Re: Re: Sell your home NOW, posted by Travis on May 17, 2003

"Do I really need to spend my money to find out how a pig reacts to chicken pox? NO! But our goverment does this sorta thing very often."

The reason there are cures to any disease directly comes from research like you site as being useless.  If you do not have health you have nothing - period - end of the game.  So, it is in the direct interest of any citizen for the government to do their best to prevent disease - especially highly infectious disease.  

One of the  way viruses work is that they change over time -just like mammals do - only faster.  Viruses also periodically jump from one species to another.  Many of the flu fears that occur during the "flu season" are viruses derived from bird or swine viruses.  The current SARS problem occurred most probably when a swine or bird virus jumped into humans.  How did this occur?  There are a number of possibilities.  

It is just the latest and most visible virus in which this has occurred.  By studying how viruses move between species we are better able to understand how to combat similar viruses that jump into our species.  Without animal models of human disease I believe the statistic is that the average American would live 28 years less (albeit I give you data published Americans for Medical Progress - a research advocate group - but there numbers do make alot of sense).  Do you really want that?

[wsbill]

... in response to Mis-informed, posted by Bobby Orr on May 17, 2003

We are getting all sorts of new virus.  But has the world really changed all that much ?  NO.

[Bobby Orr]

... in response to Re: Sell your home NOW, posted by wsbill on May 17, 2003

Now your argument makes sense - buy low, sell high.

[wsbill]

... in response to Now you are making more sense, posted by Bobby Orr on May 17, 2003

This will make the sense of my economy crash, that will be arriving soon than you think.

http://www.businessweek.com/bwdaily/dnflash/may2003/nf20030516_8652_db042.htm

[Bobby Orr]

... in response to Re: Bobby read this..., posted by wsbill on May 17, 2003

I agree the US needs a strong not a weak dollar, and it may contribute to your theory of a coming deflationary depression, but you need the confluence of alot of other factors for it to occur.

[vagn]

... in response to True but not necessarily related, posted by Bobby Orr on May 17, 2003

A weak dollar makes imported goods more expensive.
That means we will buy locally produced goods
rather than imported goods.

A weak dollar makes our products more attractive
to the rest of the world.  They will buy from us
instead of from germany and the surrender monkeys.
That means greater production and more jobs for us.

A weak dollar means the real value of your home
is higher than the dollar amount you paid for it.

A weak dollar is like a weak case of the flu.
It has its charms in comparison with the strong version.

On the down side, the price of oil goes up.
But most of us can arrange our lives so that
we drive less, walk more, and use less fuel for
heat, and less electricity.  So for most of us
the fuel cost rise is something to
complain about, not a real problem.

[DanM]

... in response to weak dollar has its charms, posted by vagn on May 18, 2003

A weak dollar means that standards of living decrease because our money will by us less. What politician is going to vote for that? Who is going to volunteer for a lower standard of living?

A weak dollar means millions of retail jobs and small businesses will go away, because people will be spending much less on consumer goods. Are you sure there will be an incremental lift in jobs when you net these job losses from the manufacturing gains? Are economy is built on consumption and not production. To change so abruptly would be very painful for tens of millions of Americans. Maybe you would be right in a long-term scenario, but it would be a very painful net loss for several years in the best case scenario.

A weak dollar means that people from other countries will stop depositing their money in the USA. Do you have any idea what that will do to us if foreign investment left the country in large amounts?

I used to think like you about how we should devalue the dollar and enjoy the benefits of a weak currency. The benefits are really cool and even seductive when they are viewed in a vaccum. When you look at things in the aggregate, however, it does not make a lot of sense.

Our standard of living dictates our options and this is not likely to change.